Just for an Hour of Every Day
by Lizzy0305
Summary: For one hour every day, right after midnight, Harry can see the dead. He wants to rid himself of this gift, but it proves harder than he expected as one of these echoes turns out to be more vivid than the rest and he makes Harry question both his sanity and his actions.
1. I

_To all the freaks out there, who, like me, enjoy the cold shivers, the little tremors in their heart. For those who like being frightened, who enjoy the sense of excitement terror brings them. For those who grew up on stories about monstrous creatures, for those who do not fear the darkness but what lurks in it._

 _For full effect, read in the dark with some creepy ambient music ;)_

* * *

 **I.**

 _Walk the halls and walk the forest,_

 _Wander along the decay;_

 _See all that is and see all that isn't,_

 _Just for an hour of every day._

 **IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII**

As the Grand Clock chimes midnight, Harry opens his eyes. He climbs out of the bed, slipping into his sneakers and starts his midnight routine. He walks down the staircase from the tower, not waking Ron and Neville, and heads to the Common Room.

Lavender Brown sits there, chatting with thin air. No sound comes from the girl, she is only half way on this side after all, more dead than alive. She has no voice to speak, her eyes are blind, her ears deaf to the living world.

She does not bother Harry, and in return, Harry does not go there either, pocking her, talking to her, shouting at her to hear him. He knows by now, what she is, or rather that this vision of her is nothing more, than an echo of a future that never happened. It is simple enough, however, it took months for Harry, Ron and Hermione to figure it out.

It all started back in September, when Harry returned to school. The first night, just like tonight, he arrived back in his Common Room just after midnight. He stepped through the portrait hole, waving with a smile to the Creevey brothers, realizing only as he stepped onto the first stair that they were not supposed to be there.

A part of Harry's brain knew where they were: buried under six feet of soil a little bit north from Birmingham, in a cemetery of a little town. He had been there when the boys were laid to their final resting place, he had stood next to their crying mother. And yet he also saw them in the Gryffindor Common Room, laughing and talking.

Back then, it took him a moment to realize, they weren't talking. Their mouths moved, yet no sound came from them. It was as if they had been silenced and Harry walked closer. They were not ghost, that was for sure, their body looked solid instead of opalescent and transparent. He talked to them, asked them if they needed help. They ignored him, or did not hear what he had said. He had reached out and tried to touch them, but his fingers went through Colin, who seemed undisturbed by this as well, still ignoring Harry.

Harry ran. He ran up his room and hid behind the curtains of his bed. He stayed there until the sun was up and then a couple more hours until the other boys in his dormitory were awake as well. He waited till Neville and the others left, and told Ron what he had seen.

That night they visited the common room together. The Creevey brothers were gone, but it was Lavender sitting there then. Harry pointed at her, hand shaking, but Ron shook his head. They called for Hermione's expertise, but the girl saw nothing, too.

In the upcoming weeks, Harry learned that between midnight and one o'clock in the evening he was not supposed to go out of his bed, if he did not want to meet with the dead. He dreaded that one hour every day, where he was reminded of his failures, of all the lives that had been lost because he was not fast enough.

There had been many more new faces in the upcoming nights, newer and newer people he had met, who were all dead. Lupin was in his old classroom, reading a book, Tonks sitting near him, playing with their son – that was hard to see. Dumbledore would roam the corridors, meeting him had Harry hiding in his bed for a week. He saw Fred as well, but never mentioned that to Ron, nor Hermione. There were others too, the list endless.

It is December, and Harry has almost gotten used to it. Dumbledore still makes him lose it, but Colin, Lavender, Fred or Remus he all but welcomes. Sometimes he sits with Remus and Tonks in that one hour and watches them talk and smile and live together, and it warms his heart. Sometimes he sits with Fred who keeps inventing tricks even after he died. It is weird and slightly insane but Harry gets used to the company of the dead over the months so it makes no difference to him.

Hermione was the one, it is always her, who found the reason in the end. As the other two do not see the echoes, they have always suspected it must be because of the war, or Harry's death or some different otherworldly experience Harry had.

McGonagall had never asked many questions when they requested to use the Headmaster's private library, just that they keep quiet and stick to hours when she was not working there. They went after midnight and sat with a smiling Dumbledore and read book after book on Death.

It was just half a sentence in a children's book Hermione decided to read not for research but for a good night sleep. She woke Harry and Ron at three in the morning and they did not even go back to sleep after that

 _"_ _Death sees it all; what was, what is, what could have been."_

The living cannot hide from it, the dead do not want to. And whoever rules over Death, sees what it sees; the future that never happened, the present, and all that was before.

It is a gift, Harry wishes not even for his worst enemy. As a Master of Death, he sees Death at work, sees the shadow around a dying bird, sees the soul leave the living but only in that one hour every day. He can see the world going grey as winter comes; can see the life flickering in Aberforth as he sells them Firewhisky. Harry cannot tell how long the old man, or anyone has, but when the light is flickering, Death will soon come and bring darkness with it.

It is a dark gift, one Harry hates and wants to get rid of. It eats his soul away and he can feel the Darkness approach him. Night after night, it comes closer, wrapping cold tendrils around Harry's heart. He wants it gone, he wants to rid himself of the shuddering cold, of echoes that grip his heart and break it day after day.

He could stay in bed, Hermione tells him every time Harry appears with hollow circles under his eyes, but Harry knows that is not a solution. That would be ignoring the problem. He has a gift, he is ought to use no matter how much it hurts. What the gift is for, he does not know yet, which is why he wakes up and walks out of his room night after night.


	2. II

_By the way, the story has 10 chapters, all written, but not beta-ed yet, so i'm terribly sorry for my mistakes._

* * *

 **II.**

 _Look for life among the living,_

 _Find nothing but white and grey._

 _Death is around, and it's here to stay,_

 _Just for an hour of every day._

 **IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII**

Harry reaches the great oak doors just as the clock stops. The echo of the last beat of the bell rings in the empty hall, and Harry looks over his shoulder.

Students run behind him, their feet clapping the cold stone noiselessly. Lupin smiles over them, rolling his eyes, as two boys run into each other and fall. Harry can see him chide them softly, and the boys (young, too young, Harry thinks to himself, heart going cold as stone) sniff, but stand up dusting off their bums. The echoes are always there, and Harry knows it will not be any better even outside, yet he opens the old doors and slips out into the cold.

The door creeks shudderingly loud, and Harry looks back almost afraid that next he will see Lupin chiding him instead of the first years. But Lupin is dead and he does not hear the sounds of the living world more than Harry can hear the sounds of the dead.

In the light of the moon the snow glints grey-white almost blue. Children are playing outside, dead children who will never feel the cold wind on their faces, who will never throw a snow ball, never build another snowman. Children who died in a battle they were not supposed to fight. They are not ghost, yet they are here instead of the afterlife, or whatever is beyond the veil.

Yet in this dead word they play like the living, they run, breathe throw and laugh. Harry watches them as if watching muted television. They are there but not really. They are too grey and too dark, lifeless in their lifelike games.

Suddenly, the cold seems too cold to Harry. He trembles wildly. He turns away from the dark, frozen surface of the Lake (and the skating dead children) and walks towards the Forbidden Forest. Even previously it was a dark place full of strange creatures and now, at an hour when the dead walk among the living, it becomes even scarier.

At the edge of the forest, where Hagrid's hut is, giants sit in the grass around a black fire. They are roasting something, perhaps human, perhaps a deer, Harry cannot tell, and he does not feel like examining it from closer. He knows they cannot hurt him, and yet he keeps his distance. There is an internal voice guiding him through all this, and that voice keeps whispering to him to stay away from the dead.

He manages to obey, no matter how hard it is, even when he sees Dumbledore. He keeps his distance from them ever since the first night, he does not talk to them, does not touch them. It is right like this. The living is not supposed to mingle with the dead and dead is too far away to ever reach the living again. He knows there is only one person who would put this vow to the test, but he has not met that person yet.

It is darker in the Forbidden Forest. The echoes that creep around him belong to Death Eaters and more often than not darker creatures show up around him as well. Every step he takes makes him question the purpose of him being here at an hour like this, but a part of him will not rest until he finds that one person he still needs to meet.

He needs to be here more than he needs to be anywhere else. The others he had seen, but this man has eluded him like he eluded Death for years. But Death, as always, had caught up with him in the Shrieking Shack. And if he died during the battle, his echo must have been around here somewhere.

Harry had turned the castle upside down for Snape's echo but it was nowhere. The grounds proved as ineffective as Hogwarts, so did the Shack. The Forest is all that remains for him to search through night after night. Why he needs to see Snape is a question he does not ask himself often. Maybe he just wants to make sure his Professor is _truly_ dead and will never come back to haunt him. Maybe it has to do with the lingering memories in his head. Maybe with something else, something darker than Death, the echoes and even the Forbidden Forest around him.

The eerie moonlight penetrates the leafless trees but its light does not reach the ground. There is a thick fog around Harry, and he could not see the trail he is to walk on even if there were one. But there is no path to follow just the darkness, the silence and the howling wolves far, far away.

He does not run into wildlife, nor centaurs in this one hour. It is, as if the living would hide from the echoes in here. He walks blindly through the dark, dismissing his fervently beating heart and the long dead shadows around.

It has been weeks since he decided to explore the Forest. Two weeks of walking in the dead of the night with the falling snow eating up all the noise he would make. He is as silent as the dead around him. He barely notices Fenrir as he crosses his way. The werewolf sniffs the air then runs off giving Harry a fright.

Cold sweat sticks to his forehead and he rubs his hands together, blowing mildly warm air onto them in hopes of staying warm. He sinks his fists into his pocket against the chill, even though he knows his teeth are not chattering because of the weather.

Yellow eyes glint among thick bushes and Harry stops as if he ran into a wall. His eyes go wide, as he watches slowly as an animal, smaller than a wolf, stalks out from behind thick trunks of old trees. It dashes lightly from gnarled root to root, sneaking under lower twigs and behind snow covered stones.

The fact that Harry can hear as the snow crunches beneath its soft legs makes him more terrified than the animal itself when it saunters right in front of him. Harry wants to produce his wand from his holder around his lower arm, but the moment he moves the animal snarls, white as snow fangs glinting in the moonlight. It turns its back to Harry and looks over its shoulder, waiting, waiting.

Harry takes a hesitant step and so does the animal – a black fox, Harry decides after seeing the white tuft at the end of its bushy tail. The next moment they are running, dashing through the forest to where Harry does not know, but it terrifies him that he does not even remember which way he came from.

Sometimes he loses sight of the fox and only sharply flashing yellow eyes show him the way. Until there comes a moment, where even the eyes leave him and he stands alone next to an ancient oak. He left the echoes behind him a long time ago, he is alone in this part of the woods, feels the loneliness creep into his bones, into every fibre of his body. Where should he go, which is home and which way is death and eternal darkness? Will he end up frozen in the forest? Why did the fox lead him here and where exactly is he?

He keeps walking towards what he considers forward, where he had last seen the yellow eyes. A naked briar stands in his way, seizing him by his coat with sharp fangs. He presses through, thorns cutting into his face and hand. He hears a strange cry ahead, more like a scream. It is close, right ahead of him and sounds like someone was trying to summon the devil itself.

Once he clambers through the bush, his eyes land on the fox right away, who sits in the middle of a small clearing. Its face is turned towards the moon, its unnerving cry like a wave of unforbidden spells floods the clearing and sneaks into the woods behind Harry. Then it turns his face towards the young man and Harry feels a shrill of fear drive into his heart.

The fox's fur is pitch black, except the end of its tail and an interesting mark on its head. The white blotch around its face looks like a skull with black hollows around the vividly flashing, yellow eyes.

First time in a long while, Harry feels terrified. Even if the fox is calmly sitting there under the moonlight, there is something in it, that makes Harry scared to the bones. He grasps his wand, slowly edging back towards where he came from.

A soft sound, not more than a sigh hits his ear from behind him and he swiftly turns around. A man stands there, leaning against a chestnut tree and for a second relief floods Harry, then he realizes, the man is an echo and not just any. It is the one he has dreaded to meet from the moment he saw Colin the first night in September. His heart clenches in fear and suspense.

"Snape…" He breathes and cold air wafts from his mouth.

"Potter." Says the dead man.


	3. III

**III.**

 _Nightmares come and the truth will go,_

 _The dreams will keep it at bay._

 _Light and courage will keep the dark out,_

 _Just for an hour of every day_

 **IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII**

Harry wakes, drenched in cold sweat. It is Saturday morning and Ron let him sleep in a bit. There is brightness outside already, he can see it even through the thick curtains of his bed. He stays in bed for a couple more minutes and stares at the blinding white gap between the edges of the fabrics. It is blurry and intense like his dream. But was it only a dream, he wonders. Trying to shake the memory of the black fox and Snape from his head, he stretches and pulls the curtains away letting the sunshine of a new day in. He puts on his glasses and sits up in bed.

"Morning, Harry," Neville greats him brightly from behind a book.

"Hullo, Neville," he yawns back.

"Ron is waiting for you in the Great Hall, he says." Neville informs him with a smile. "Hermione, too."

Harry nods and climbs out of bed, heading towards the bathroom. He looks into the mirror, the face that looks back is the same as always. He has dark bags under his eyes from roaming Hogwarts and the grounds during the night. He is tired and restless every night and tired and restless every day and that takes a toll on his looks. All, except the last night, he realizes. He has not slept through a night in ages. He usually wakes every hour or so, haunted by the echoes he sees.

He showers and dresses quickly to grab a small bite before the Quidditch practice. He does not play anymore, but it is nice to see where the team has gotten and help out when needed. He runs down the stairs, livelier than he felt in months. Where last night Lavender sat, now two third years play Exploding Snaps.

The living has taken the world again and Harry feels relieved. He is not sure how he feels about Snape though, he is not even sure he had truly seen the man. It was probably just a dream, nothing more. He must have fallen asleep while waiting for the Grand Clock to chime midnight.

Once in the Great Hall, he waves a hand to McGonagall as he passes her, and she nods back, her expression turning from severe to mildly irritated. Harry spots Ron's ginger head over the other children and hurries his steps among the tables. People watch as they always do, which is why Harry sometimes prefers to walk among the dead. He can be invisible there, no one pays any attention to him ("Potter," a voice echoes in his memories, making his steps halt for a second) and he likes that a lot more than the gazes that follow him now.

"Harry," Ron says when he spots his friend. "Morning. Finally, had a good night sleep, did you?"

Harry shrugs as he sits down. "Better than usual. But I had a weird dream. There was a fox and… it was weird." He decides in the end not to mention Snape. His friends know about his nightly excursions, but they do not know what he is looking for, nor do they approve of most of his actions.

"Dreaming of a fox might mean you have someone in your life who will betray you," says Hermione turning a page in the Prophet.

"I thought you don't care about fortune-telling," Sniggers Ron.

"What Trelawney was teaching was no better than any carnival trick. Dreams and dream reading however hold a deep importance in witchcraft." She tells them. "It's no fortune-telling, but it can tell a great deal about your psyche."

"So," Harry starts with a grimace, pointing his fork with a piece of sausage pierced on the tip first at Ron then at Hermione, "Which one of you will betray me?"

Hermione just rolls her eyes and closes the Prophet. "You know it doesn't work like that." She looks at Harry's hand that holds the fork and grasps it. "What happened to you?"

Harry looks at the back of his hand, too and his heart misses a beat or two. There are marks there, long red lines made by thorns of a briar. "It wasn't a dream…" he says softly. He is excited and terrified at the same time.

"You've been wandering again," says Hermione reproachfully. "And now you go into the _Forest_?"

"Leave him be, Hermione. You don't know how it is. None of us do," Ron says quietly. A shadow crosses his blue eyes and Harry knows why. "The dead… Seeing a picture of Fred hurts. And Harry can see them walk around."

"That is exactly why he should stay away." Hermione says.

"It's not that bad." Harry tells them, probably for the millionth time. But they do not see it, and hence cannot understand it either. What it feels to run into Lupin and Tonks kissing, or to see the Creevey brothers play… or to see Snape and Dumbledore as if nothing had happened. It is bad, it hurts, but at the same time, it is heart-warming as well. It seems as if Harry would glimpse at a moment of their afterlife, look at them through a door into their own personal Heaven. They are all happy as echoes, even Dumbledore seems to smile more often as he sits at his table.

Icy wind tears into their clothes but it is not colder than the air between the three of them. They left the morning topic at that, Hermione not willing to say another word once she realized she stood alone. Harry feels bad for her as he understands the sentiment. He knows it is not normal to look for the dead on his own instead of hiding and waiting out that one hour under his covers.

He knows that would be the better course of action and he tried it not once. There were nights when he did not step out of his room and when he did not go out in search for Snape. His dreams then where horrifying. He did not see the dead and nor the living. He was all alone in the castle, on the grounds, on the whole world. There was no one else but him and he woke up screaming.

So instead of saying another word, Harry walks next to his friends, taking furtive glances at the Forest, wishing it was midnight once again, so he can come out and find Snape again.

The Quidditch practice holds no interest now and it seems even Ron and Hermione can sense that his mind is somewhere else.

"We could go in there," Ron suggest quietly. "Now."

Harry's gaze snaps at him. "You would?" Ron nods and they both look at Hermione expectantly.

"Don't let it be said that I've grown out of adventures…" Hermione shakes her head, but she stands up too.

Ron kisses her softly on the lips, "Thanks 'Mione," he grins.

The edge of the forest is not any less scary then it was yesterday at night. The echoes are gone, but that means the real danger will be there and whoever knows what lurks among the trees nowadays. Not all that is dark has been destroyed during the war.

They follow a small, snow covered path for now. It is bright enough that they do not need their wands yet, but Harry knows soon the leaves will shade out every ray of the faint winter sun and all they will have is an eerie grey fog.

Harry is the one leading them, but to where, he does not know. He relies only on his instincts and those are known to betray him.

The snow crunches beneath their feet and the silence that rules the forest of the dead at night is taken over by many noises. There are birds chirping. Soft sounds, songs and trills echo among the trees. Crows and ravens shriek into the whiteness and sweep from high branches when they see them. The number of the black birds has risen in the last couple of months. Even though the dead bodies had been buried, they crowd in the woods in large numbers.

When something moves in the foggy darkness ahead, they change course, taking a wide turn, but always seem to end up on the same narrow, almost non-existent path Harry started to follow. Until there comes a time when they step off it on their own accord and Harry starts following a new route. He can hear Hermione's sharp intake of breath, as if she would be getting ready to tell him they are not supposed to wander off the trail ever.

But she stays silent, unlike the forest that seems more alive now, than ever.

"Can you hear that?" Harry asks when a sudden shriek hits his ears.

The other two looks at him weird and they shake their heads.

"What?" Ron asks, looking around them with a wand held high up.

Another heart-shuttering cry sounds up in the middle of the forest in front of them and Harry stares at them, waiting, waiting. Yet his friends look dumbfounded, and he realizes why it seems familiar.

"It's the fox from my dream!" He cries and turns on his heels, running towards the sound.

He tries to ignore the flash of emotion on Hermione's face, but it edged itself into his mind. There was doubt written on the girl's face, and something else: a shadow of fear. He can understand, it is not the first nor the last time he sees or hears something others do not. The doubt he can understand, the fear hurts. But he will show them, he says to himself. He will show them the fox, the clearing, if not Snape.

The fox is not there, just the clearing. It is smaller than it looked in his dream, though, he doubts he had ever dreamed of this place. Last night was reality, so was the fox, and so was Snape. That gives him courage to step onto the blinding fresh snow.

"Harry," Hermione says quietly, but Harry interrupts.

"This is it, Hermione! This is where I've been in my dream, except it wasn't a dream!" He points at the briar not two feet from him. "This is the briar that cut my hand and the fox was over there in the middle of the clearing." He points now to a spot not ten feet from them.

"Harry…" Hermione says now more firmly. There is something strange in her voice. Harry can hear it but he ignores her as he looks around, searching.

"And the chestnut tree… The chestnut tree is right there!" Ron stands in front of the tree now, not Snape, but Harry runs there inspecting the ground as if he could find any evidence in the fresh snow. But the dead leave nothing behind, just a memory of their echo.

"Harry!" Hermione cries now, desperately trying to get his attention. It is not his name, but how she says it. Not just desperate, but tear filled, shaky. She is on the verge of crying.

"What?" Harry asks looking from the crying girl to Ron, who is white as the snow, eyes darting around as if he would be seeing shadows everywhere even in the bright sunshine.

"Don't you remember this place?" Hermione asks, tears falling from her brown eyes. "Don't you?"

"That's what I told you!" Harry says, impatient. "In my dreams-"

"Not just in your dreams, Harry," says Ron quietly, his tone breaking. He gulps and a shiver runs through Harry. He does remember this place. He had seen it before, before all this. He had seen it last May.

"This is where you died, Harry," Hermione whispers.

A murder of crows set off from the trees around as an invisible fox howls into the freezing air just at the edge of the clearing. Dread settles onto Harry's heart and he cannot tell where it came from. The Forest, the echoes cannot hurt him and he has never been afraid of them, yet now, he is more than terrified.

"Run." He says to Ron and Hermione, but they do not move. They just stand and look at him as if he would be mad. And maybe he is, because he cannot explain the awful sensation in the back of his head, the heaviness of his heart, the shaking of his hand. There is something there in the clearing that they are not supposed to see, something that can be more dangerous than the Dark Lord; Harry can feel it but he cannot explain.

A dark shadow moves at the edge of the forest on the other side and Harry screams this time, "RUN!" and finally they move, all three of them pushing through the thorny briar not caring about deep, bleeding cuts. They dart among trees as fast as humanly possible, lungs burning from the cold air. Harry can feel the shadow at his heels, fangs only inches from grasping around his ankle and making him join the land of the dead.

He sends a spell behind his back but he knows it is pointless. No spell can hinder Death. It is creeping nearer and nearer and Harry can hear Hermione's terrified scream. She is running right ahead of him, unhurt but she can, too, sense the coldness behind them.

"Harry!" Ron shouts, not able to look behind to make sure that his friend is still there.

"Run!" Harry just cries again. "Just run until you reach the edge!"

Why it would make any difference, he does not know. Instincts, he keeps telling himself, it is his instincts that tell him what to do or perhaps it is his magic. All he knows is that they need to run and they will be safe only when they step out of the forest.

The grey fog becomes thicker and thicker, around them, the air heavier to breath. It is as if the forest itself would gather against them to halt them and keep them there forever. Suddenly, Hermione trips, shrieking shrilly as something gets hold of her leg. Ron sends a spell there, and in a flash of red the gnarled roots holding Hermione burst apart like glass. Hermione is back on her legs, but it's too late. They can see the edge of the forest, it is only a couple hundred feet, but darkness gathers in the way.

They step closer to each other, wands pointed at leafless trees and mossy rocks, but there is no one there, no enemy shows its face, no spell comes. Yet they can all feel it, the terror in the air, the motionless cold that surrounds them, the vivid, almost tangible smell of darkness.

The forest becomes darker with every passing second. The fox cries behind them. They turn but in vain, it is not there anymore. Its echo however is terrible, it shakes the ground beneath their feet. It is petrifying, and mind-numbing and Harry feels his wand almost slipping from his sweaty hand. He holds on stronger and cries into the air with a shaking voice.

"Show yourself!"

Ron is the one who gasps loudly, it is almost a small shriek. Hermione sobs, knowing what she sees.

Harry turns too, slowly facing the black fox once again.

It is sitting on a dead trunk of an elm tree. Its black and white tail coils around its slim body as if to protect It from the cold, but Harry knows _it_ is the cold, the one who brings the eternal coldness. The skull marking on its face looks more vivid by day, its black body against the whiteness of the snow more elegant. Its yellow eyes flash dangerously as it watches them, unmoving. It is growling quietly; its face is turned into a vicious snarl.

"You can't hurt us!" Harry screams at the fox, who waves its tail irritated. It puts its head down a bit, looking at Harry with its vivid yellow eyes through dark lashes, as of considering him for a moment. It pulls the flesh further from its fangs that are white as the fresh snow, it growls so loud now, it makes the ground tremble.

The sudden cry behind them will surely be their undoing. They turn, sending a red spell, that blast the branch into pieces. The raven flies off, indignantly croaking about the attack. Harry is sure the fangs of the fox will sink into his neck momentarily as he turns back towards the elm trunk.

The animal is gone and so is the dreadful sensation.

"Let's go," Harry says urgingly, ushering his friends towards the edge of the forest. He does not need to say it twice. They run and once they are outside, they all fall to the ground, panting.

"I'm never going back in there again." Ron groans, splaying out on the snow. The air comes out of his lungs in quick wafts of air.

"Neither will I," Hermione shudders. "And nor should you," she says to Harry. "That was… that was…"

"Death…" Harry whispers darkly. "That was Death."

He does not know how he knows, but he is certain about what and who the black fox is.

Ron clasps Harry's shoulder with shaking fingers as he says, "Why do I have the feeling you will be going back in there tonight?"

"That's insane, Ron," says Hermione, almost hysterically. "No one in their right mind would go in there again."

"I will," says Harry determined. "Snape's in there."

The argument they have after this, is not something Harry wishes for anyone and by the end, he feels he would rather face the black fox again, than Hermione. But in the end, they agree that it is Harry's decision, and not anyone else's. So, as the Grand Clock chimes midnight, Harry gets out of bed.


	4. IV

_To live and die and live again,_

 _There must be a price to pay:_

 _A heart that beats again by night,_

 _Just for an hour of every day._

 **IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII**

At the edge of the forest, Harry turns around. Ron and Hermione are holding on to each other's hand. Hermione is carrying one of her ever so useful little flames, Harry had still not learnt to conjure.

"Be careful in there," Ron says and shivers as his gaze wanders towards the trees.

Hermione just seems torn between wanting to hug him or kill him. She goes with a hug in the end. "I promise I'll come back," Harry says to her quietly, not even Ron hears him. Hermione slaps his back, but there is no real anger or force in it. She is just frustrated. Harry lets her go and steps to the edge. He looks back at his friends, then turns ahead.

Lupin walks past him into the forest, carrying a little bag for ingredients. He is talking with someone, who did not die, with Professor Sprout perhaps, or Madam Pomfrey. Harry follows him for a while, but then Remus stops with his companion, and start picking some plants. Harry walks past them and lets instinct take over once again.

He could all but close his eyes, his legs would take him to the clearing right away. Interestingly, the dread is gone from the air. Once the dead take the place of the living, it feels less scary. Death Eaters come and go around him, he finds and loses Remus again, then suddenly, he is at the briar bush again. He climbs through and blood freezes in him as he sees what waits from him in the clearing.

It is the black fox, but it is not a fox anymore. It is Death in the moonlight, wearing a dark cloak. Its face is still nothing more than a mask, and Harry suspects, no one has ever seen the true face of Death, yet this seems truer than the animal, though not much. It is just an empty skull of a fox, eyes not glinting yellow anymore but dull white. They are not like the snow, they do not sparkle in the light of the moon, but are dim and lifeless; dead. At first, Harry thinks there is a hood covering the top of the white bone skull, but as he steps out onto the clearing and moves closer to the motionless shadow, he realizes it is hair, or long black fur, messy and wild, unkept and dry.

"You have nothing to fear," it is not Death who speaks and Harry turns around again, looking at another shadow, a more familiar one, leaning against the elm tree.

"I'm not dead," Harry says. "Me, it can still hurt."

"Not yet," Snape rolls his eyes. "Your time will come, though. There is nothing you can do to avoid it, so why fear it? It won't take you sooner than you are supposed to go, and you will not be able to run away from it, when it does come to take you."

"Like yesterday?" Said Harry stepping closer to the elm tree.

Snape frowns at his advances, but keeps talking. "Yesterday, you were a fool. It is not your pet, nor your friend, nor your enemy. It is not yours to show, to seek out, to hunt, to disturb, whenever you wish. No matter who you are to It."

"Who am I to it?" Asks Harry. "And who are you to it? You are dead, but most echoes don't speak, yet you can. You speak to me, you can see me, you can see it. You're more than a shadow."

"You know, who you are. You know _what_ you are. What I am…" Snape sighs, heavily. "I am more than the dead and less than the living. I am its voice to you."

"And what does it say?"

"To bugger off."

Harry laughs. "Death wants _me_ to bugger off, is that it?"

"Mostly." Snape nods.

Harry turns back towards the shadow that has not moved from the middle of the clearing. "Take back your _gift_ , and I'm out of here." He tells it.

It moves and its eerier than anything that has happened until then. It glides on the snow, there is no wind, yet its black cloak and hair moves gently. Its skull face is a gruesome mimic of the hauntingly beautiful fox it used to be, just white bones and dead white eyes, and as it tilts its head it seems to smile a terrible smile of sharp fangs.

Harry wants to hide and run and get as far away from that nightmare as possible, yet he stands his ground. It stops a couple feet from him, but once again, it is Snape who talks.

"It cannot just take it back, Potter." He says with a wild chuckle when Harry jumps by his voice. "You are his Master. You need to _give it back_."

"How?" Harry asks from it. He stares at the blind, dead eyes pretending that he is not horrified, that fear has not taken over his heart and does not make it beat a thousand-times faster. The dreadful grin becomes more enunciated, and though Harry knows it is just a sickening game the shadows play on his mind, he fears it can read his mind.

"There are no secrets from it," Snape assures him. "And you know the how."

Harry turns on his heel, as, first time since he ever laid eyes on the black fox, anger takes over fear. "You think I wouldn't have given up this stupid gift already, if I had known how?"

"I do not know, Mr. Potter. I am no more than a puppet after all. And yet, even I can think of a thing or two I could do, would I want to cease to be the Master of Death."

Harry stands there between two people, one who could easily read him since he was eleven, and one no one can hold any secrets from. He cannot deny it, yet far be it from him to agree with Snape. Maybe he has suspected all along, what he needs to do. Maybe, he even tried to look into it about a month ago. And maybe, he gave up because he was not ready to let this gift go as there was one more person, he needed to see.

Snape moves closer, swift as a shadow. He towers over Harry, who lifts his head, almost daring Snape to say it out loud. "Why am I the only one you can hear, Potter? Why is it that I cannot rid myself of you even after I cross to the land of the dead?" There is anger in Snape's voice and the next moment he grabs Harry's throat, long, bony fingers wrapping firmly around his neck.

Harry wrenches himself away from the man. He is dead, his brain keeps telling him, yet Snape's touch on his skin was very real, and even more, it was warm as the touch of the living. "What are you?" He hisses, feigning anger and disgust when it is the last thing he feels.

"I told you," says Snape, sounding irritated. "A shadow of the living, but more alive than the dead. My heart beats," he says grasping Harry's hand and placing it over his heart, "my mind works, I have my own thoughts, needs, desires. Yet, I am bind to Death, I speak what it wants me to say, I appear when it wants me to be seen. I am Death's to command."

Harry can feel the heart pumping under his fingertips. It is faster than he would consider normal, but he adds that up to Death standing near them.

"Is it your master, as I am its?"

The world turns suddenly dark, there is no moonlight anymore, even the stars have died. Snape disappeared but the fear and the terror is almost tangible in the air. Once again, Harry feels the need to run and scream in the maddening fear that cripples him.

Then all change again, the light is back and the fear is gone just as sudden as it appeared and Snape is back, though looking a bit shaken. "I would greatly appreciate it, if you stopped bloody insulting _Death_ , Potter." He snarls, pushing his hair out of his face. "You are either an idiot, or out of your mind if you think for a moment that you can or ever will control Death."

"This afternoon, it stopped because I told it so, didn't it?" Asks Harry carefully. "I mean no offense, just asking." He adds quickly before Snape disappears again. He does not want that.

Snape is slow to answer, as if he would be, like Harry, scared to anger the horrible, growling creature behind them. "It did. It was furious, but it did."

"What would happen, if I told it to let you go?"

There is surprise in Snape's face but the boiling anger from behind is more tangible than ever. "Don't you ever dare tell Death what to do again, Potter," Snape thunders in his strictest of voice. "A master you are like a kitten tied to a dragon. You hold the leash but you have no idea, what power lies on the other end."

"I never wanted this," says Harry sadness in his voice.

"Then destroy the leash," Snape says coldly. "Destroy the Deathly Hallows."


	5. V

_I swear to Merlin, sometimes the comments are the only thing keeping me alive. So please keep them up :)_

* * *

 _Unkindness circles over us,_

 _They fly looking for a lonely prey._

 _Black birds of death leave us to be,_

 _Just for an hour of every day._

 **IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII**

Furious, Harry wakes in his bed again. He knows this time even without any evidence that it was not a dream. He smacks a fisted hand into his pillow, frustrated and angry.

He looks outside. It is almost dawning. The faint sunshine barely has any power to penetrate the thick snow clouds. The Hogwarts Grounds are white and unstained from the snow that has fallen last night, though Harry does not remember it ever happening. Yet once again, he is in his bed, while Snape remains in the Forest.

The Forest… the thought hunts him now more than ever. His attention turns to the trees far away, to dark, dead, leafless trunks. Ravens circle over the tree line looking for a prey. Tiny mice, song birds, dead bodies might all attract them, but Harry suspects, there is a different reason why they all crowd here. The reason wears a fox scull as a head, and has eyes like ice.

Harry shivers and steps away from the window, afraid of what he might see would he keep staring. He kneels in front of his bed right next his trunk. What Snape had told him echoes in his mind. He lays his hands onto the wooden box, but is too scared to open it. He knows what he would find there, knows what he might need to do with them, but he is not ready yet.

The third Hallow is somewhere in the Forest. He dropped it walking towards the little clearing, when his parents, Remus and Sirius were all walking next to him. Where it could be, he does not know and a part of him, a dark part, that likes walking among the dead, the part who wants to see Snape again, does not even want to find it – not yet at least. Maybe next week. Another week will make no difference for sure.

According to Ron and Hermione, he came back last night on his own two legs, said only a couple of words, but was unharmed when he stepped out of the forest. He tells them during breakfast that he does not remember a single thing, and they agree that he should not go back in there. Harry promises them, he will not, then goes on with his Sunday. He plays chess, does his homework, helps out McGonagall with a couple of things, then when it is time to go to bed, he showers and changes into his pyjamas. He says goodnight to Ron and the others and pulls the curtains on his bed. Then, he waits.

When he can hear Ron's faint snoring, he changes back into warm clothes, pulls on thick boots, a winter coat with fur lining, and a knitted hat. He goes out of the tower, trying to avoid the living as it is not even midnight. He almost runs into McGonagall, who is sneaking down to the kitchens for some midnight snack, but Harry manages to hide just in time.

Now, when the old oak door squeaks loudly, he slips past fast as he can. Luckily, McGonagall has already sat down with her cup of tea and ham sandwiches, and the other professor are patrolling other sides of the castle at that time, so Harry reaches the Forbidden Forest unnoticed.

Just as he would feel relieved, a professor does find him, and he all but jumps out of his skin in fright.

"Well, well, well, if it isn't our Chosen One," Snape says. He stands at the tree line, no more than a black shadow among the darkness. "You are early tonight, Potter."

"You scared me," Says Harry reproachfully.

"You better be scared," sneers Snape. "The dead should make you piss yourself in fear."

"Even you?" Harry asks and walks into the forest, trying to finally see the man. In the distance, he can hear the Grand Clock chiming. His one hour (theirs, says a quiet voice in his head) is ticking.

"Especially me," whispers Snape and steps in front of him. But the man somehow does not frighten Harry. Not anymore.

Snape looks how he always have, not even death had made him uglier. His skin is shallow, though in the moonlight among snow covered trees, it looks whiter, and not yellow. His nose is just like a beak still, his cloak bellows even when he does not move, as if an eerie wind would always blow around him. His moves are graceful and elegant, his clothes never catch in a tree or a thorny bush. It is almost as if he would be just a ghost, there but not truly.

Snape looks just as he always has and now always will. The dead do not change, they do not get old. Like the children who will never throw a snowball again, who will never grow up, Snape will never have white in his hair, or deep wrinkles on his face. He will never marry, never have children, nor a family of his own.

Suddenly, Harry hears a child's voice. Soft giggling comes from the forest around him. He sees someone moving to his right and raises his wand. A girl runs out of from behind an ancient looking hazelnut and runs straight against Snape's long legs. She giggles again, her voice just as haunting in the empty forest as her unexplainable presence.

Harry looks up at Snape to see how astonished the man becomes that there is someone else among the living who can see him, but Snape is not surprised. He draws an arm around the little raven-haired girl and smiles smugly. Finally, Harry understands, and now he sees the similarities, as well. Not just the black hair, and the larger nose, but the thin figure, the cheekbones, the dark eyes.

This frightens Harry now, and he stares at Snape wide eyed. And just as sudden as the girl appeared, white shows up in Snape's long raven hair. At first Harry thinks it is just the snow, but no, the man's hair turns grey white within minutes, his face looks wrinkly. He is old, and gaunt, cheeks hollow, but he still looks like himself. His teeth then start falling out, and the skin on his face becomes tighter and tighter, and older until it rips and melts away. Harry can see bones, white as snow, black eyes turning white, then disappearing leaving behind just a dark empty sockets.

"STOP!" He screams, staggering back. He cannot take it anymore, he launches forward and grabs Snape by the collar and shoves him back. Snape collides against a tree, laughing, once again his old self.

"Bastard…" Harry groans angrily. "You bloody _bastard_ …"

"The dead you see, Potter, are content. They do what makes them happy." He explains, still leaning against the tree.

"Is this what makes you happy?" Says Harry. "Causing me nightmares?"

Snape's laugh is dark, just as haunting as the fox' was. "Who knows what causes you nightmares, Potter."

"You do…" Harry answers quietly. It is rather just a loud thought to himself, and not meant for Snape. "So what does make you happy?" He asks louder.

"Who knows…" shrugs Snape. The previous evil grin is back on his face. "Maybe it's a black haired little girl," he says and as he speaks, the little girl appears again. She runs to him, her cheerful laughter rings alive like fairies in the dark forest at midnight. She dashes around the tree Snape is leaning against, but when she comes out on the other side, she is different. "Maybe it's something else." Snape goes on with a low, dark tone.

Harry watches as the girl turns into himself. It is an older version of him, around twenty-five. A bit taller, and broader at the shoulder. He has a hint of a five o'clock shadow on his face, but overall, he looks a lot healthier than how Harry feels nowadays. This Harry is not plagued by echoes of the dead for sure, he is probably not bothered by anything at all.

Expect perhaps by Snape, who pulls him to himself, and driving long fingers into messy black hair kisses him.

It is more than surreal though it could not be further away from scary. It _is_ confusing though, for Harry to see an older version of himself, being kissed by Severus Snape – what kissed devoured by. The two men stand at the tree, leaning against it. Snape pulls the other Harry fully against his own body, and the other Harry has no wish to pull away.

Snape's fisted fingers around Harry's mop of hair, his other hand grabbing into taut buttock, the sounds, the tiny moans, the soft groans, it could and should all upset Harry but it does not. What upsets him, what makes him raging jealous and angry is the black eyes that do not close while kissing, but keep staring right at him.

Then the other Harry vanishes and it is just Snape there, leaning still a bit breathless against the tree, lips wet and slightly redder then before. He swipes his thumb over his lower lip and Harry realizes it is more coloured because it was bitten and is bleeding.

Snape smirks, licking the blood from his thumb. "My happiness could be the stuff of your nightmares, Potter."

It is not quiet how Harry feels about what he had seen, yet he tries not to even think about it as it seems, not even his thoughts are just his own now.

Instead he asks, "If I destroy the Hallows, what will happen?"

"You will not have a leash anymore and the fox will become wild again. You lose the power to see the dead."

"Where is it now?" Harry asks, looking around only now realizing that neither the fox, nor the horrifying creature is present. Only him and Snape.

"Doing its business," Snape says with an almost invisible shrug. "Reaping."

"I cannot do it," Harry says after a moment of silence. "The Hallows. I can't destroy them."

"Then sentiment, as it has always been, will be your undoing once again, Potter." Snape reacts uncaring. "Look at yourself. How long do you think until you completely lose your mind? With, what, two hours of sleep at night you won't get far in life."

"It's not sentiment." Harry shakes his head. "I do not have them all. I dropped the Resurrection Stone during the war, when I was about to die."

"I'll help you look."

Harry stares at the man for long seconds. "Why?" He asks in the end.

"As you might be able to see were you to use your eyes," Comes Snape's answer as he pushes himself away from the tree and heads towards the depth of the forest, "I do not have anything better to occupy myself with."

"There's no way we can find a tiny stone in this giant forest," Harry insists. In truth, there might be a way, in fact he is certain that Snape only helps him because he _knows_ a way. Yet, deep down, that small voice claims their task to be impossible because he does not want to lose his gift. The dead he might be willing to part with, but not with Snape, not yet.

"There is always a way," Snape says quietly.

"Always," Harry echoes in a faint voice. A memory surfaces, quietly sneaking to the front of his mind and the middle of his heart. "You loved my mother."

It is a statement, yet it comes out more like a question. Pointless question, as he knows the answer. All Snape did was for Lily and Lily alone. And not for Harry.

Snape stops dead in his tracks and turns around slowly. "Your mother…"

Snape's fingers flex, and Harry realizes why. Snape does not have his wand anymore. Of course, the dead do not need a piece of wood to channel their magic, yet the idea of being wandless makes Harry itch. There are motions he is used to, instinctive little touches not even he is aware of. Gripping his wand whenever he is angry must be one of them for Snape.

Snape wears a strange expression that Harry cannot explain. He looks aside as if ashamed of something, and Harry does not understand. Snape died a hero, he died to save Harry. What is there to be ashamed of?

"I loved Lily," says Snape simply to a dead trunk of an oak. Then he finally looks back at Harry. "I was obsessed with her." He says, his voice strangely flat and dead. The little girl that appears now is red haired and green eyed, her laughter bright like angel's singing. She does not see them, or perhaps just ignores them, finding the purple butterfly she's chasing more interesting. "She was the brightest thing in my life. The light that lead me." He holds out a hand and Lily finally notices him. She looks up at the man who seems a lot older now, then he was twenty minutes ago when he was kissing the other Harry.

She, too, reaches towards Snape with a small hand. Coldly, Snape goes on, "She was my light, but as always, darkness was more tempting." Just as Lily' and his hands were to touch, he fists his own, and Lily disappears.

His haunted, black eyes are back on Harry. "Yes, your mother was my best friend and I loved her. And my love for her was what made you an orphan."

Harry thinks about all that he knows and all that he had heard now. Then, as he walks past Snape, shoulder bumping against the other man's, all he says is, "Voldemort killed my parents, not you."

The forest feels lighter this night. There is no fog on the ground, though neither is any moonlight on the sky. Snow clouds gather over them, scattering that little light the castle offers all over the Grounds. There is little to no brightness the depth of the forest is allowed to have tonight and Harry secretly relishes the certain unfruitfulness of their upcoming quest for the third Hallow.

"We're close to the clearing now," he tells Snape instead. "How do you want to do this?"

Snape just glares at him as if hearing his previous thoughts. "Put that away," he motions with his head at Harry's wand then squats.

Harry pushes his wand back into its holder and watches Snape as he places two hands onto the ground. He murmurs words that Harry cannot understand. They send a wild tremor through Harry' whole body, though. They are ancient words, probably older than the world itself, Harry knows _that_ at least. A single vivid, ice blue wave of light emanates from the ground where Snape had touched it and as it passes over the ground, the snow, the grass, the trees and everything, the world turns around them.

Everything becomes darker, except Harry, who shines bright white.

"What-what happened?" He panics, trying to rub off the glow from his skin.

"Look around, tell me what you see," says Snape in a calming voice.

Harry does so. "I'm bright white, but everything… it's so dark here…" Dark yes, but not as cold. He cannot feel the icy wind anymore. "The trees have a certain glow, too, but compared to me, they're dimmer…" His voice turns faint, as he slowly starts to grasp what happened. He looks at Snape, who watches him expectantly. "You especially... you look so dark."

"Welcome to the land of the dead, Potter."


	6. VI

_This, by far, is my favourite chapter in this story, and I really hope you will like it as well :)_

* * *

 _Night will die and light become,_

 _Even our nightmares will be away;_

 _Colours flood the life we hold,_

 _Just for an hour of every day._

 **IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII**

It has been a week. A full week of not just seeing the dead but walking in their world as well. It is something that would drive any man to madness, and yet Harry cannot wait for midnight to come. He eagerly awaits the sound of the Grand Clock hitting twelve. Even before the first chime, he stands at the edge of the forest waiting impatiently and he knows, he is not alone.

On the other side of the tree line Snape waits for him and welcomes him the second the sound of the first strike hits their ears. He is there, wearing his black cloak, his black eyes glint like onyx in the moonlight once they glimpse Harry. With his eerie, knowing smile, Snape expects him at the forest and their forays into the dead world become stranger and stranger still.

Even during the first night Harry has understood what it means that he is the only one shining bright white there. He is the only one _alive_. The rest of the world covered by cold snow is dark compared to him. The trees, the grass the bushes have a pale blue radiance, but they are very faint during the wintertime. Next to him, Snape is the only one with an echo of a glimmering light around his slim body, his however, unlike Harry's, is a strange dark light. Because of its dormant stage, the world has only a hint of life in it, its glow giving off only a trace of light blue glow. Snape, however, is eternal darkness among all that.

That is how they will find the last Hallow. Snape says, in the land of the dead, a token of Death will shine as bright as the living. Therefore, they search the forest, keeping their eyes to the ground, looking under ice and snow, turning up rocks and moss eaten trunks, to find that one single, tiny little stone.

It is hard, worse even, than finding a needle in the haystack, because then at least one has the inclination to find the needle, but Harry seems to have lost his motivation if he ever had it. The third Hallow eludes them and Harry hopes it will never show up, that the earth has opened up and swallowed it, because he does not want to lose Snape.

Such a ridiculous notion, he knows and he does not even say it out loud, yet he also knows, there is no denying it. He does not understand it, does not even try, it would be absolutely hopeless, but at the same time, it is clear in his mind and heart what he wants – or does not want. To find the Hallow would mean that the echoes, Remus, Tonks, Fred, (Snape, a voice like a crow repeats over and over again: _Snape, Snape, Snape_ ) would be gone and his little tours to the Forbidden Forest at night would come to a stop.

He is not sure he can do it. He is addicted to it. To Snape or to the excitement, he is not sure. He does not even realize what he finds exciting in all this and yet, even now for the seventh time, he stands there at the edge of the forest eagerly waiting for the voice to greet him, heart beating ferociously, palms sweating.

"Welcome, Mr. Potter."

There it is, the keenly awaited sentence that has kept him going from lesson to lesson, breakfast to lunch to dinner all week. The castle, that once has meant an eternal playground is now a prison, and Ron and Hermione his guards.

He loves his friends, but they do not understand what it means to walk with Snape in the forest to listen to him talk about nothing and everything at the same time. They do not understand what it feels like to talk to someone, Harry has been certain he will not ever see again. They will never understand and therefore, Harry's late-night visits will, for a while, remain a secret.

"Evening, sir." Harry says with a soft smile.

"Missed me?" Snape asks darkly, stepping closer.

There is something in Snape nowadays that creates a wild turmoil in Harry. It is sentences like this, that simply make no sense, that are so unlike the man, which give a dangerous little twist to Harry's belly. And yet as Harry watches him even now, towering over him, lean dark body, glinting eyes, and a smug smile, he must admit, he did not think of anything else just returning to the forest with Snape all day today.

He does not reply, which makes Snape smirk. Harry walks past him and heads towards the depth of the woods.

"We're not alone today," Snape says quietly, catching up to him.

As if on cue, the black fox crosses their path. It zig-zags in front of them, perhaps to help them search, or maybe for an entire different reason. Maybe it is here to reap, to take a soul. But whose, Harry wonders. The forest has seemed empty, almost vacant in the last week, and now that he thinks about it, it is weird. They have met with neither centaurs, animals, nor wolves, nothing at all. It has been just the dark fox, Snape and Harry.

Do the animals avoid these parts of the forest nowadays, knowing what lurks here? Should all the living stay away? Is Ron and Hermione right, should Harry stay safe behind the walls of the castle, or will he stay unharmed as the Master of Death?

He does not pay attention and, in the end, realizes that he has been led away from the path to the bare field, where he had died. Snape does not seem bothered by that, then again, he is dead. Unlike Harry, he has nothing to lose.

A strange, creeping sensation claws its way into Harry's heart. Maybe he _is_ paranoid, but the vacant forest suddenly feels void of every sensation. It is cold, rigid, malevolent, and endless, which makes him shudder wildly. He stops, afraid to continue forward, but Snape places a hand onto the small of his back and guides him.

But where? Where are they headed? These are unknown parts to Harry, darker, murkier areas of the forest, he has never been to. He feels helpless as he walks along the two other creatures – what else could he call them; one only an echo of what he used to be, the other more than a human could ever hope to be become: the God of the Underworld.

And yet, his legs move, one after the other, counteracting his every thought of stopping and turning around. Not even the sheer dread is enough to stop him from moving, from following the black fox, as it moves on the snow, gliding through the thick forest as nothing more but a shadow.

After all this, after all what he has seen, it is a wonder that what truly terrifies him are the footprints that the fox should leave in the snow, or more like their absence. As it moves, black paws touch the white ground, yet the soft snow does not sink in under the weight of the animal, there is no sounds at all of crunching ice.

In fact, there is no sound at all. In the middle of a forest, just past midnight, there is absolute silence.

Does the whole forest feel the dark enmity walking among them? Do they hide in terrible fear of being the next? Should Harry, too, hide instead of following the other two?

They stop in front of a wall of dry creeper that has climbed all around a gigantic chestnut tree. The silence is so profound, Harry feels a great pressure building in his ear. Everything seems dead and empty around them, even the trees stand bare and dying in the darkness.

The fox stands next the chestnut, looking back over its shoulder, waiting. Harry does not move, he cannot, he is not willing to step one step closer to what feels like his end. Once again, he stands in this forest, absolutely petrified with fear, not daring to take one step, not knowing where it would take him. And yet, deep down in his heart, he knows he would be back tomorrow if there were a tomorrow at all. When the next midnight comes he will be at the forest waiting for Snape to say hello, and to lead him, wherever he wants.

And that is what truly terrifies him. Not Death, not a dying, empty forest, not even his own demise, what might await him on the other side of the chestnut. But Snape, who is no more than an echo, a quiet whisper at one in the morning that temps him, and lures him away from the light and into the darkness.

A touch on his hand makes him jump. Cold sweat builds upon his skin, but Snape takes his shaking hand and he is the one who, in the end, pulls Harry to his doom. And Harry is alright with it. A sudden calmness settles over his mind and body as he holds on to Snape, their fingers entwined. All will be well, he tells himself.

The fox is the first to disappear, stepping carefully over gnarled old roots, as if it could trip and fall over. Next is Snape, looking back at Harry with an expressionless face. Then Harry goes, willingly and without a single worry in his heart. He is calm now. Whatever will happen, he will face it serenely.

The world changes once they move to the other side of the chestnut. They are in the _other_ world, it comes to Harry, when he notices his own bright radiance. But he is not the only one, first time in his life, he sees something else, bright as a star that has fallen onto the ground.

It takes him a moment to see past the white shining and recognize the creature lying in the snow. It is a deer, and as he looks upon her, she lets out a loud frightened wail.

There is a scent of blood in the air.

She is writhing in her own blood. The red substance is frozen into her brown skin. Harry can tell even in this dead, black and white word by the dark spots covering the glimmering illumination the deer casts. She is glowing even in her death, she is radiant and bright as the sun, it almost puts Harry to shame. It takes him a second to understand why.

The deer pushes again, frightened when it notices (or simply senses) the black fox moving closer to it. If the deer is pure life with its intensity, the fox is eternal darkness. It emanates a dark black glow, a horrible sheen that swallows every light. It is like a blackhole that absorbs everything it touches.

Harry shudders as he watches what is happening, pulling closer to Snape. It is beautiful and saddening all at once. It is death and life right in front of him, facing each other. The sheer light is blinding now, and in contrast the darkness becomes even darker.

He knows there is nothing he can do, and even if there was a spell he could use, he is not allowed to interfere. This is life taking a natural turn, Death is here to claim what rightfully belongs to it.

And as that thought crosses Harry's mind, the fox is gone and instead the creature stands over the deer, white bone skull reflecting the animal's light. Its blind eyes are stuck to the animal as if ready to leap after her in case she runs, but she will not move an inch anymore. She pushes and writhes but that is all she can do. Something went wrong, and now she lost too much blood. She is barely alive even now, yet she has one last purpose in life and she is ready to fulfil it. She has strength for that, but not for anything else.

Her light is fainter with every moment. Death stands over her. It bends the knee and lowers itself to the frightened animal, what lets out another cry – her last. Something, however, answers the cry with a weak yelp of its own. While the deer turns faint as the forest around her, the tiny fawn she just gave birth to sheds light like nothing. Compared to her, even the sun is dark.

Clawed fingers, twice as long as a human's, touches the deer's head and immediately, she ceases to move. One last, shuddering breath and she dies with her baby deer quietly wailing at her legs. Harry feels a pain building in his chest mix with anger that he cannot explain.

So many have been taken from him and yet, here he is, getting angry over a little fawn. Yet, he does not dare to speak, and Snape's fingers flexing around him in warning tells him the same. Death is for no one to command and Harry understands that, yet he does not want to see the little deer being touched by those awful clawed hands.

He turns away, but Snape tells him otherwise. "Watch," he says ever so quietly.

They wait, minutes pass and the little deer, still not even able to stand, keeps on quietly wailing. She's covered in blood still; her dead mother's cooling body is the only thing that keeps her remotely warm. Harry knows she has less than an hour, perhaps not even that much.

Death stands over her, waiting.

A twig breaks behind them. A wolf or a fox, a real one this time must have felt the scent of blood. Harry wants to reach for his wand but Snape stops him, holding onto his other hand as well. He is oddly warm, even though they had been standing in the cold for what feels like half the night. _You only have an hour with him_ , a voice reminds Harry.

It is not a fox, nor a wolf, nor any wild predator. It is another deer, that must have heard the desperate cries of the little one. Also, she is not alone. A little deer, not a new born, but couple of weeks old follows along her trail. She sniffs around the dead animal and finds the tiny fawn. When she starts licking it, Death moves away.

An eternity later they are standing at the small meadow again. It is strange what seeing Death and Life does to the soul. Harry is mesmerized and horrified at the same time. He could not move on his own volition even if he wanted to, but thankfully, Snape still holds his hand.

"You cannot stay the Master of something this powerful," says Snape quietly with dark, distant voice that seems not to be his own.

The creature stands in front of Harry, its white fox skull face still seems to grin. "The Hallows were never meant for one person."

It is speaking, however its mouth does not move and the voice Harry hears bears only a faint familiarity to Snape's.

Haunting white eyes watch him. "I'll find the third one." Harry promises. It will be the hardest task of his life. Not finding the Resurrection Stone, but destroying it and giving up on Snape. Why, he cannot tell. Why it hurts to even think of letting Snape go after he got him back, is a mystery Harry is not willing to investigate. He would have to open doors in his heart he locked forever after the war.

Death is gone within a blink of an eye. Only its haunting gaze lingers on for a couple more seconds.

"Undoubtedly, he is correct." Snape says.

Harry looks at him, watches him more intently now. In the world of the dead, he looks slightly more haunting. Or perhaps it is not the shadow world that does this to him. Maybe he has indeed become thinner, his face more skull-like in the past week. His eyes too, that glimmer in the night light seem dull at the moment.

"What are you doing?" Harry asks, reaching towards Snape's face.

"What do you mean?" Snape does not pull away.

"You look… tired." Says Harry. "The dead don't get tired."

"No," Snape agrees. "They do not."

Harry touches Snape's face, his brightly shining hand against darkly glimmering skin. Except it changes, and Snape's skin seems to take on Harry's white light. Eyes closing, Snape sighs and presses more to Harry' hand, as if bathing in its warmth, yet it is his face that has stayed warm even in the freezing night.

Harry entwines their fingers once more and watches as the white light seeps into Snape again. For a moment, colours happen where they touch. It is like white ink would be flowing up on their arms, except it all happens underneath their skin, as if the strange white light would shine from within them.

It is warm, Snape's touch. His fingers, his face feel sunkissed and comforting. They feel alive. It breaks Harry's heart all over again.

"What's happening?" He asks, breathless and happy and despairing all at the same time.

"Life," says Snape and kisses him.

His lips are the warmest.


	7. VII

_We hope and fear, dread and desire,_

 _And we have promises we might betray._

 _Yet our touch warms up an icy world,_

 _Just for an hour of every day._

 **IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII**

That night way past three o'clock, Harry is still staggering in the forest. Now, he wishes he would just wake in his bed, but of course that sweet relief is not granted to him. Snape had vanished, his warm kiss only a faint, torturing memory now. Harry feels insane and not sure if it truly happened at all. Did he just kiss a dead man? Is that even possible?

As he clambers through the bushes, he feels more and more sick. Interestingly, he does not feel nauseous because he kissed Snape or because he liked it, but for an entirely different reason: that it cannot happen again. It is not true. It is a dream, an echo, a memory that will vanish the moment the Hallows are destroyed.

The doors in his heart that he so cowardly chose to close after the war, after all the loss, are gaping open now, their hinges torn off by the sheer force of that single kiss. And the pain is there, a pulsing red hole in his heart, with gratitude all around it. A man who saved his life, the man who tormented him stands behind those doors. The vile man, who was cruel to him all his childhood, and the man without whom he would stand beside the fox now. And now, there is a third door, with a ghost, who walks the forest with Harry, who is warm when the night is cold, and whose kiss taste of sunshine.

It breaks him to pieces to think of the man, lying close to death on the floor in the Shack. It crushes his heart to recall how nice that kiss felt. How alive he was, how full of life the world had become. Snape glowed, just for a moment, his skin was like Harry's. Then he vanished as the sounds of the Grand Clock's chiming drifted through the forest just to reach them.

After this, how could he destroy the Hallows and say goodbye to Snape forever? How can anyone expect him to throw it all away and still, how could he live on like this? Snape is not just a man, he is dead, gone beyond the reach of the living and it is only the darkest of magic that keeps his shadow nailed to the world of the living. But he would suffer here, his place is not here. Tales like this never end well, Harry knows theirs will end in the same misery. Snape will vanish and Harry will stay on mad with grief. How could he not. Even these hours spent during the daylight are agonizing.

Hermione waits for him once he steps out of the forest. She is sitting on the ground, wrapped up in a warm brown blanket that is at least three times larger than her. She has a reproachful look on her face, but once she sees Harry, she abruptly stands and rushes to him.

"What happened?" She asks, her voice full of concern.

Harry falls to the ground and looks up at her. She cradles his head to herself as Harry tells her what actually happened. He tells her of Snape and of the fox on the clearing, and tells her how hard it is to not go out in the night, how tempting every single meeting has been, how bad the guilt was, and yet, how good it felt. He tells her about the terrible nightmares that come when he refuses Death and do not go outside to visit the dead. He tells her how alone he is in those dreams, how empty he feels, how terrified, how immensely lonely. Because he has friends, he has Ron and her too, yet no one will understand how lonely dying makes you.

But Snape understands and it feels good to be with him. He sees the darkness to what it is: not terrifying but just the unknown and he fears that not. Not even death scares those who are already dead.

He tells her of the deer, of the bright light, of life and Snape's darkly glowing skin. He tells her it makes him ache to see the lifeless body and yet he returns night after night because even a lifeless body is better than none.

He tells her of the kiss and that is the first time she looks concerned. And last, he tells her of the chestnut tree, of what he has expected to happen there. As he talks, Hermione looks scared more than anything.

"Him, I was ready to follow to the other side," Harry says in the end. His voice is raw, and the sun is coming up.

"Let's go inside Harry." She says, ushering him towards the castle. "We'll get you some Dreamless Sleep. You need to get some rest."

They go and Harry does not resist when she pulls her into the castle then up one staircase then the next. She lets her undress him and pull his pyjamas over his head. She tucks him into bed and puts a little vial to his lips. He swallows eagerly, ready for some restful sleep.

Sleep comes, though it is anything but restful. He is alone at first in the dream. Like bees, there is a constant buzzing around him. There is no source to it, but it is getting louder and louder. He feels a familiar presence behind him, and he looks over his shoulder.

There is no one there, just darkness.

Then the buzzing stops and he glimpses the white skulled fox in the distance right in front of him. It is lurking in the shadow, hiding from plain view.

When Harry notices it, it walks closer. Strange how in reality it drifts in the air, yet now it walks. Its footsteps echo in the darkness. Harry shivers. They stand, facing each other.

Long, clawed fingers touch the skull. Harry closes his eyes knowing what it wants to do.

"Look at me," it says, strangely sounding like Snape back in May when he was close to death. Was it meant for Harry or to the black fox?

Harry even turns away not willing to look at the strange creature. He does not want to see Death's true face. No one is supposed to experience such horrors.

"Look at me," it says again, voice so like Snape's that Harry shudders. He can see the man behind his closed eyes, but when he opens them, it is the creature standing there. Its tone is hypnotizing and Harry is not able to resist. With eyes wide open, Harry watches as it lifts the mask and he wants to scream, though he does not even see anything yet.

It is Snape underneath the fox skull not Death. His expression is blank, yet Harry feels there is something that is making him anxious, something Snape wants to talk about. Harry does not want to talk. He kisses Snape and manages to surprise the man. He can feel that in how tentative he is at first in his response but then Snape grasps Harry's hips and pulls him closer, just to push him away.

"We are not allowed to do that." Snape states only inches away from Harry. His whole body is shaking, Harry can feel it.

He is so warm to the touch, his face, his lips, his hands sneaking under Harry's shirt. It makes Harry's skin burn wherever they touch. It makes him feel alive. Snape kisses him again and again, wild and desperate before he steps away with a firm shake of his head. "Not allowed to touch you."

It is a battle Snape seems to be fighting with himself because Harry already knows he does not care. He moves closer taking Snape's hand – now clawless, watching it as it starts to glow. He kisses it and sees it turn colourful under his lips. For a moment, he wonders how nice it would be to lie in bed with Snape in the middle of the night when it is dark outside. He would kiss every inch of skin and make Snape glow everywhere.

He would do that…

…If the man was alive.

However, Snape is dead and this is a dream. And even the dream is breaking apart. It shutters like broken glass. First only a web of small cracks, that get larger and larger.

"Hold on to me!" He cries for Snape but the man steps away, backing towards the splitting darkness.

"Find the stone, Potter!" Snape says. "If you ever want to see me again, find that goddamn stone."

Then the world shutters and million pieces fall around Harry. He ducks but in vain, the pieces do not hurt him, not more than Snape's words anyway. What does he mean see him again? Will they not meet in the forest tomorrow night?

A hand shakes him awake.

It is Ron. He looks concerned.

"What happened," Harry croaks through dream-sore throat.

"You happened," Ron answers with a small grin. "It's afternoon, mate. You ought to get out of bed. Besides old McGonagall wants to see you."

Harry changes into some decent clothes and thick boots again, then follows Ron out of their dormitory and into the Gryffindor common room. McGonagall is there, waiting for him near the fireplace. Hermione stands next to her looking suspiciously abashed about something.

Harry's heart misses a beat. Among all this, of all the people, McGonagall is the last he wants to talk to. She would not understand. She's too practical and besides, a teacher, moreover Headmistress of Hogwarts. Harry cannot stand the judgmental looks she might give him if she knew about the kiss and everything else.

Ron seems to notice his hesitation. He pulls him away on the top of the stairs, so that the ladies downstairs would not see them yet.

"Look, Harry," He starts, and Harry feels like he needs to say something fast. He is not ready to hear Ron tell him he should not go back into the forest. That he is not supposed to meet with Snape ever again or go out after midnight to see the dead. He ignores a little voice that whispers, Snape might never wait for him just at the treeline of the forest.

"Ron, I'm okay." He says in the end, in his most convincing voice. "Really," he adds just to be sure.

Ron rolls his eyes. "Yeah, sure you are, Harry. But in case, you know, terrible nightmares torture you one night, or you freeze your arse off walking with Snape in the forest, there is something I need to tell you." He ignores Harry's indignant look and goes on without missing a beat. "You are an utter moron, Harry. We are your friends, and we've been through some stupid shit together. So, when something happens, you don't just go, turning to the dead instead of us, you understand? Even if we don't agree with what you're doing that does not mean we won't have your back when you are doing it, got it?"

Harry allows himself a little smile as he nods. "I think I got it, yeah."

"And please don't judge Hermione too hard. I think turning to a Professor when something goes bad is wired into her. But in her defence, we were really scared for you last night, Harry."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be," Ron shrugs. "I would have done the same if it was about Fred. But I would have told you."

There is silence between them for a moment, Harry can feel that Ron wants to ask something, and he is rather certain what the question will be.

"You can see him too, can't you? Fred?" It hurts Ron to say the name, he all but presses it out of himself.

Harry nods. He's seen Ron's brother a million times, every night. He sometimes sat with him, watched him play tricks on others, or even read a book. He slowly figures why Ron has never asked this of him. It would be like an eternal torture if they would be reversed and Ron would be the one seeing Snape - not to ask about him day after day, not to want to see him too.

"He's happy," Harry tells him, though it sounds stupid the moment it slips out if his mouth. Fred would be happier if he could be with his family, playing tricks with his twin instead of the dead.

Yet, Ron seems relieved and nods then pats Harry on the shoulder, as he asks, "Are you ready?"

When Harry nods they head down on the stairs. The common room is empty. Just the four of them stand there close to the fire and it makes Harry wonder if it is by chance.

"Whatever is said between us, Mr. Potter, it is confidential, do you understand?" She says by greeting.

"Hello, Professor. Yes, I understand."

"Great. Ms Granger tells me of your… gift." She says. She is angry, Harry can tell. Her lips are thin as razor, but her cheeks red with fury.

"More like a curse, I would call it," Harry answers lightly.

"And yet you were stupid enough not to even mention it to me. Someone could have cursed you, Harry, there are still people out there with bad intensions. I should have known that when the three of you spends extra time in a library it is not for studying."

"We did study, Professor," Ron says with a wide grin. "I've never read so many books on Death before."

McGonagall gives Ron a glare, that would send Death covering, but otherwise ignores him. She turns back to Harry. "I could have given you relief for your nightmares, aid in your search, support with your loss."

"I'm sorry," is once again all that Harry can say.

"Well, you better be." She sniffs. Her eyes are strangely wet as she continues. "Because the most important thing I could have given you, Mr. Potter, is Severus Snape."


	8. VIII

_Seek and search and find nothing,_

 _Only Death will come in the way._

 _But we'll meet under the stars alight,_

 _Just for an hour of every day._

 **IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII**

They are headed towards the dungeons, where else would Snape be. Harry is not sure what to think anymore. Is Snape here? Is he in the castle? Is this the same echo he has seen and the others see him as well? Or could it be that he has been mistaken all along and the Snape he saw was not dead at all? Questions, and too many of them make Harry dizzy.

He follows the other three blindly, not even seeing where he steps. A fourth shadow joins them, but his eyes do not focus on the person. They turn corners and walk up stairs then go down on a different flight. The dungeons seem eternal and so are Harry's thoughts.

What if Snape's alive? What if he had lived here all along hiding from the people who still wish him dead for betraying Voldemort? And if they truly met in the forest, did they really kiss? Did Harry kiss more than a shadow there? Could it be?

Or, a darker thought occurs to him, what if Snape is dead. His body has never been found after all. What if that is what McGonagall talks about? Did they bring him back to the castle to bury him next to Dumbledore?

Which is it? Dead or alive? Harry can barely walk, he is shaking so badly. He has a horrible feeling in the pit of his stomach. It is almost like they are not alone. As if a different shadow not just the ones cast by the torches would be following them down here. A stranger, more eerie shadow with a face of a fox's skull and a long, black, mangy hair.

He finds himself in front of a door, a huge black oak. McGonagall is talking to someone Harry does not know. She is the forth shadow that had joined them, an older lady, about the same age as their Head of House. Though she looks a couple years younger than McGonagall, her hair is pure white, eyes dull brown and tired.

She is the one who steps forward, her name irrelevant to Harry at the moment, and waves her long thin wand in front of the oak door to grant them access to the room behind. She is also the first to enter, followed by Minerva, then Ron and Hermione at last. Harry cannot will himself to walk in.

What will wait for him inside? Is it going to be Snape? Is he dead? Is he alive? Just one step, that is all it would take to find it out, yet Harry does not feel brave enough to move. He does not want to know, not truly. Strolling in the forest with Snape has been like a never ending dream – a nightmare, a daydream all at once – and walking into this room now would make it a reality.

He is shaking and shivering, feeling the fox in his heels, gnawing at his flesh already, hindering him from marching into that room. He does not know what compels him in the end, but he steps forward. Once the first step is made, there is no way back, and no way to slow down either.

He stumbles the first few steps; over the threshold, is if invisible clawed fingers were holding him back, catching at his feet, but then he all but finds himself running toward the white bed in the white room.

On top of pure white linen, lies Snape eyes closed, unmoving.

His presence, his face, his physical form hits Harry in the chest like a wrecking ball. He staggers against the bed, his mind screaming, his heart breaking into million and one pieces which then scatter around his whole body piercing his innards, causing _so much pain_.

White skin, hollow cheeks, black hair, closed eyes – _dead_. The terrible word echoes over and over in his mind, in his soul, banging the doors he so well guarded a long time ago.

Snape is dead.

Of course, he is, he has known this all along, the man walks with Death for Merlin's sake, and yet seeing him like this, spread out, lying covered by bright white linen, looking as if he would be just sleeping, it is killing Harry like nothing else. How cruel, he wants to scream, how absolutely horrible of McGonagall to rip even the last of hope from him that Snape might be alive. What a bastard Snape is to die, to come back but not really, and to haunt Harry like this.

"Harry…" Hermione whispers to him, holding his hand in hers. He wants to pull away, he wants to pretend it is all well, but it is not. Snape's warm touch, his lips on his plague him more than anything now that he sees those lips, can reach out and actually touch the man, yet still there is no man to touch. That thing lying on the bright, crisp white linen is just a vessel that once held a great man, but now is nothing more than rotting flesh.

Hermione holds his hand firmly and guides it closer to Snape's body. He resists now, fighting, pulling back. How could she know what he wants anyway? That he wishes to feel the warmth on the man's skin, hear his gasp, his voice. Those wishes will never come to be, the fox made certain of that; the fox and Voldemort and Snape too, that stupid moron. Who is he to sacrifice himself for Harry? No one had asked him to do that.

Now, Harry is angry. He is angry at everything, at Hermione for wanting him to touch Snape's dead body, at McGonagall for showing him this… this empty vessel, at Ron for just standing there, gaping. He is angry at the white linen for being this bright, at the world for not weeping in grief that a brave man has died, at Snape for dying, for leaving him then coming back, for kissing him, for walking with him in the forest and most of all, he is angry – furious with himself for being stupid enough to fall in love with a dead man.

And yet once his fingers touch the pale white body, he immerses in the sensation. It is cool, dry skin under his caress, soft and covered with small imperfections. He can feel a subtle stubble, sharp cheekbones. Hermione quietly gasps next to him when he strokes the soft lips. A phantom breath ghosts over his thumb and he feels like crying, screaming.

He does not just want to destroy the Hallows, he wants to annihilate Death. He wants to smash that skull bone with only his fist and demolish whatever creature hides beneath. He wants to wrack havoc in the Land of the Dead until whatever barrier there is, will cease to be and the living and the dead will walk the same world.

He feels it again, a second outbreath, light as a ghost's touch on the tip of his thumb, but warm like the kiss of the sun on a cold winter afternoon. It is no more than a sigh and Harry lets out a sob.

"It feels like he's breathing," he tells Hermione on the verge of tears and insanity.

"He is, Harry," She says and Harry does not understand why she is so cruel to him. Then she adds, "Take his pulse."

It takes some time until Harry finally believes it. He needs to feel the constant, but slow pulsing of Snape's blood, and hear the Healer's explanation of all what has happened to Snape so far until he sits on the bed close to euphoria.

Snape was in a magical coma. He was in St. Mungo's until last week, when he suddenly showed signs of mental activity. However, when they pulled him from the coma, he was still unconscious. As St. Mungo could do nothing more to him, they (being mostly Minerva and his Healer) decided to move him back to Hogwarts. Their plan did not, however, go as well as expected. Snape has not woken up since then, and even worse, his health started to deteriorate.

What Harry wants to know and is too scared to ask is, could it be that this Snape wakes with the dead and at midnight he starts roaming the Forest with Harry?

There is only one way to find out the truth to this, without getting confined to the insanity ward of a magical asylum. He needs to wait for midnight to come once again then go to the forest and find either Snape or the last Hallow.

He does not move from Snape's room until the moon comes up. McGonagall and the Healer come and go, bringing food, taking away the food, Harry just sits there on the edge of the bed, watching Snape's chest rising.

Up and down.

Up and down.

Up and down – so go his own hopes as well as midnight approaches. He does not know what he hopes for. Whatever should he? That Snape will never wake and they can meet again in the forest? That Snape does wake and they might never see each other again? Is the Snape in the forest the same soul as the one lying right here?

Questions and riddles more and more come and slowly second by second, so does midnight.

Harry watches eagerly the well-known face for any sign of awakening. A twitch would send him over the moon with happiness, eyes opening would make his heart stop. Yet none of those happen. As the Grand Clock finishes, and only the echoes of its chiming reverberate in the castle, Harry realizes, it is not just Snape, who has not come alive tonight.

First time in nearly four months, the echoes are gone as well.

The absence of the dead should fill him with relief, should make him happy, yet all he feels is a terrible loneliness in the pit of his chest, where his heart used to be.


	9. IX

_If we never met again by night,_

 _Even Death would stay far away;_

 _If we still remembered the warmth of Sun,_

 _Just for an hour of every day._

 **IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII**

The forest is dark and full of terror. It is as if Voldemort himself would be back. There are howls and screams coming from in there, shadows move, leaves rattle, and yet Harry cannot see a single animal or monster around himself. All he can do is hear them run around, little feet tap on cold ground, snow crunches under large hooves, twigs break as furry paws walk over them.

Yet he fears not. The worst is behind him, he thinks, recalling Snape's motionless body, the horror he felt upon seeing him, thinking he is dead. Whatever comes, he cares not anymore, Snape is alive and he will get him back from the clutches of darkness.

"Snape!" He cries again for the hundreds time. He does not try to keep quiet, does not stick to any route, does not even have his own wand on him. All he has are the Hallows, two out of three, at least. He lets his instinct guide him, knowing he will find the stone tonight. He must. This is his last chance. He does not know why or how he knows this, but he is absolutely certain, that if he will not have the stone by the end of his one hour, he will never see Snape or the fox again.

He has half an hour more, when he arrives to the little clearing. He walks around ignoring the steps that he cannot hear following him. There is something behind him, walking on invisible paws, making no noise at all. It is no more than a shadow among the shadows, a lurking entity of pure darkness. He fears it not, not anymore. All he wants is Snape.

Yet Snape is not there, and nor is the Resurrection Stone. Only about fifteen minutes left to find what he seeks, and no lead at all. He starts to panic. His instincts seem to fail him when it comes to the Hallows. They are no help when he needs to find a little stone under some feet of snow, while Death appears, waiting for him in the middle of the clearing. It wears its fox skull and its mangy, black hair. He can hear the fox's cry, a warning scream to make him hurry.

Harry turns his back to the clearing, to Death, and rushes out through the naked briar. He thinks of Snape, of the very little time he has left and he trembles suddenly. Crows around him all rise into the night sky when Harry falls to his knees. They shriek words into the night, words that sound faintly human, and even stranger, familiar to Harry. Their screams, like wails of a tortured soul wake the whole forest, and even worse, they seem to wake a terrible dark entity as well. A shudder, more horrible than an earthquake, shakes the forest, yet it is not enough to mute the screaming crows.

And finally, Harry understands the ancient words, he can hear them, as Snape had told it all those nights ago, when they first entered the land of the dead.

He places his palms over cold ground, dipping his fingers under icy snow until he feels the rough earth.

The whole world goes strangely silent while he says the words, as if every living soul would be holding its breath back in expectance. " _Ad baratrum, loco te mors maneo._ "

It is right in front of him. In the dark, dead world, just as Snape had promised, the stone shines bright right in front of him. It is buried under some inch of snow as well, embedded in a moss eaten old trunk of what might have been an elm once.

Harry takes it, and a surge of power rushes through him. It is not a nice sensation, it is cold and dead and strange and he does not want it. He has to force his fingers to stay fisted around the little stone, and not drop it.

With barely any time left to spare, he runs to the clearing, briers and twigs tearing at his clothes and skin.

"I have it!" He screams into the empty dark night. "I have them all!" He repeats, but there is nothing on the clearing, no fox, no skull faced monster. Snow covers the little clearing, where he once died, the trees stand lonely and unmoving. There is no sound, except one: the chiming of the Grand Clock.

He is too late – the thought sickening. His insides are a hard knot of frustration, shame and anger. He is too late. Too late to rid himself forever of the echoes, yet he is certain, Snape he will never see again. He is too late to save Snape, to bring him back, to take him away from Death.

He is all alone in the clearing, yet he can sense it. It is somewhere there, creeping in the shadows, a familiar coldness to what lurks in Harry's own heart now. It moves and yet, its eerie scream comes from everywhere and nowhere at the same time. It toys with Harry how a cat would play with a mouse it already caught.

"Show yourself!" Harry answers the fox's unnerving cry. It is clear as an order and even Death could not misinterpret it.

It does not indeed. A hostile wave of cold energy sweeps through the forest. A chill so adamant it digs its way under furry coat and warm flesh until it inserts into bone, and flows with every drop of blood. It creeps Harry out, it makes him terrified and unable to move, and certain that he had made the biggest mistake of his life. Until it actually shows in the middle of the clearing with blackness vibrating around it like a cloud of tangible fury.

Once he has his eyes on the creature, Harry calms. He heads towards it, each step measured and slow, as if one wrong could trap him here in this strange, dark land for eternity. When they are face to face, intense blind white eyes stare down on him. He still cannot tell if it is only the peculiar line of teeth, or the skull mask is indeed smirking. There is no wind, yet its dark robes move, wave, dance with something not from this world.

There is something strangely familiar in this and Harry stretches out a hand towards the ebony white skull that seems to glimmer in the moonlight. It breaks apart by his touch like a glass or porcelain, pieces falling away in an unnatural slowness until they reveal Snape.

Harry gasps. "You're alive," he informs Snape.

"Barely," Snape admits.

And the next moment, Harry is kissing him once again, feeling the warm lips to himself, making sure that this is no dream or nightmare or stupid reality, but the truth, he had lived in the past week.

But he is pushed away. Snape is calm as he says firmly, "We are not allowed to touch, Potter."

"I don't care," is all Harry manages to answer, before his lips are back on Snape. It is insane how good it feels, how right it all is. Snape's arm around him, his warm, burning lips on his. This is no dead man, if anything, Snape's more alive than Harry.

"It is watching us," Comes the next excuse from Snape and Harry brushes it away.

"I don't care," He says again, enunciating every word, while he looks Snape dead in the eyes. There is something that his own green eyes are conveying to the man, he knows it, he can see the change, but it is too late to take it back.

This time, Snape is the one who kisses him. It is strange and wild and almost ferocious. More teeth, than lips, it feels like a goodbye, one last, desperate kiss before it all ends. Yet his strength, his body, his fierceness all radiate an open rebellion against Death.

"Behind you," Snape pants against his lips, and Harry turns right away.

The fox growls at him, its skull mark enunciated by the snarling.

"No," Harry says, before Death could do anything. "You won't speak through him again. Pick another puppet."

This angers it to the point that the hair stands on edge on the fox's back as it paces in front of Harry back and force, snarling wildly. It would attack but it is helpless. It cannot harm Harry, not just because he is still its master, but because Death cannot decide who lives and who dies. There is a balance and until his time has come, it cannot touch Harry. Which is the only reason Harry can still stay calm and not piss himself in fear. Because the fox is terrifying, with its sharp, yellow eyes glinting dangerously in the moonlight, and the cloud of blackness that seem to swallow the light around it.

It stops in front of Harry, measures him for a long moment, then it turns into a young Lily Evens.

She does not say anything for a while, just stares at Harry. Her red hair flows in the windless night as if she would be under water, her clothes the same. Then her green eyes turn to Snape.

"Tell him, Sev," She says in a fierce girlish voice, that might have actually belonged to Harry's mom once. "Tell him why you're here. He needs to know."

When Snape remains quiet, she stomps her feet. "Tell him, why you lured him into the forest, Sev."

Harry looks behind himself, and watches Snape too, expectantly. Why indeed? Why does Snape want him to destroy the Hallows? Even from the beginning, that has been the only thing he asked Harry to do.

"You are the fox," Harry says quietly, afraid. He is scared now, as his mind slowly pieces everything together until all the broken fragments fit in the picture, that scares him more than Death has ever managed to terrify him. "You are the one from my dream, who will betray me."

"I am not betraying you, Potter, only myself."

"You are," Harry says, then slaps a hand against Snape's chest. "You knew from the beginning!"

"It is not what you believe!"

"You want to die," Harry states with conviction, backing away from Snape. There is panic in his voice. "That's why you're helping Death, isn't it?"

"You don't understand!" Snape yells at him.

"I died, Snape!" Harry screams back at him. "Right here in this clearing. If I don't understand, then who does?

"You had something to live for," Snape says darkly, walking towards Harry with deliberate steps.

"Don't say that," Harry begs, not willing to hear it.

"I am nothing more than a murderer, a traitor, I have nothing and no one to live for." Snape goes on mercilessly and when he reaches Harry, he grabs him by his coat. "So when Death sought me out, I listened to its offer. Convince you to give up the Hallows that neither you, nor anyone should wield, in exchange it would do what it's best at… and reap my soul."

"DON'T SAY THAT!" Harry cries choking on his own tears. "I DON'T WANT TO HEAR IT!"

"What do I have to live for, Potter?" Snape spats.

Harry says nothing, he is not able to open his own mouth. He just stares at Snape not believing what he hears, what his own mind has already accepted. Snape cannot want to die, not now, not when Harry has finally found him.

"I have nothing. No one," says Snape quietly. There is something in his voice: self-loathing, regret, pain, Harry cannot tell.

"You have me…" The words slip from Harry nothing more than a murmur.

His words seem to pain Snape even more. He flinches away at first, then says softly, "Potter…" before he kisses him. It is a tender kiss. A true goodbye that makes Harry weep inside. It breaks apart his heart that has been full of hope since he saw Snape's breathing body. It kills him.

"Destroy the Hallows and let me die, you fool." Snape whispers against Harry's lips.

* * *

 _A/N: We have one more chapter to go.._


	10. X

_Hey guys. So here's the last chapter. Just wanted to say a quick thanks to everyone who commented, gave kudos, bookmarked this story. I know I usually write happier fics, but when I made this, let's just say I wasnt in a good place. Anyway, my point is, writing it all out in one way or another helps immensely. So yeah, thanks for sticking with me and the boys through all this, and have a lovely day :)_

* * *

 **X.**

 _To see the light, to touch the fire_

 _We must hold to what we say._

 _A silent kiss to keep us warm,_

 _Just for an hour of every day._

 **IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII**

And word by word Harry dies a little inside. All hope he had, all joy he felt has vanished, and there is nothing more inside him just black emptiness and pain. He wants to hate Snape, he wants to be angry at Death to make such an offer, yet he cannot muster any emotion. He simply does not care, whatever happens from now on, it makes no difference. Snape will be truly dead the moment he gives over the Hallows and there is nothing and no one that can change it.

He turns to the creature that wears Lily's look now. He throws his Invisibility Cloak at its feet followed by the Resurrection Stone then the Elder Wand.

Lily's face turns and once again it is the haunting creature that stands there tall and intimidating. But Harry fears it not anymore. He turns his back to it and not looking at Snape tries to walk away.

The land of the dead slowly melts away as colour seep back into the world, yet he sees the trees, the ground the sky in monochrome.

"Potter," Snape say at last just as he is about to walk away from the clearing. Hope gathers in Harry once again. Maybe this all is a misunderstanding. Maybe Snape will roll his eyes and tell him it has been all a joke. Maybe Death will shed its horrible face and McGonagall will stand in its place crying April's fool.

He hopes and yet even as he turns around, he knows it will all be in vain. This is a joke, only not a funny one. To fall in love with a dead man, only real fools do that. He knows it deep down that it has been doomed from the beginning and maybe that is why it took him this long to accept what he feels.

He looks at Snape expectantly, but ignores the creature standing next to him.

"It has to be you," Snape says and for a moment Harry does not understand it. Then it gets to him. He looks down at the pile of powerful magical items lying still at the feet of Death. His stomach sinks and tightens as if someone has just kicked into him.

"You want me," his throat tightens up and he is barely able to finish the sentence, "to destroy these? To destroy _you_?"

"You are the only one, who is-"

"Shut up," Harry tells him at once. "You want to die? Go ahead, but don't ask _me_ to be your excursioner."

"Destroying the Hallows is your task as the Master of Death. It has nothing to do… with my wish."

"Except, the moment I destroy these, it will do as you two agreed and reap you." Harry spats.

"That has nothing to do with you," Snape insists and the words hurt Harry even more.

"Nothing?" He hisses. "It has to do everything with me!" He shouts. "How do you think it felt to see you alive? To see you breathing when I was convinced for more than half a year that you were dead? How can you be so blind, Snape? If you think I don't care why do you think I kept coming back? Don't you see that this kills me?" He cries desperate. His voice is faint as he continues. "Don't you see, how much it means to me to see you alive? And you tell me, that it has nothing to do with me if I let this thing kill you?"

"Potter…"

"Don't." Harry interrupts him. He can hear the pity in Snape's voice or something equally demeaning that he is not willing to listen to.

He grabs the Elder Wand and points it at the other two items. The wand seems to vibrate in his hand as if sensing how much he hates doing this, how much he will regret this, how much he wants to drop it and run and never turn back. Yet when he whispers, " _Incendio_ ," the wand dutifully spits burning red fire that sets aflame the Cloak of Invisibility and the Resurrection Stone. He drops the Elder Wand in the heart of that fiery hell and looks at Snape dead in the eyes. "This is your choice." He tells the man. "It is cowardly and selfish and stupid but it's your choice what you decide to do with the rest of your life. Just know that for someone, you were the light." With that he walks away.

In the Gryffindor Tower, lying in his warm bed, he has no hope of falling asleep knowing what news will await him in the morning. He all but hears McGonagall's voice as she tells him that Snape died during the night, that his weak system gave up what little life he still held on to. He can see, staring up at the baldachin of his bed, how they would pull the sheets over the dead man's head to cover him, hear their sad, whispered voices as they tell him how sorry they were, and that there was nothing to do.

But Harry will know that there was something he could have done. If he kept the Hallows Snape would still be alive. If he were still the Master of Death, Snape would still be in a coma. And, maybe, with time, Harry would be able to convince him to change his mind that there is something to live for.

There are too many maybe-s and what if-s in his head to sleep or to rest. He just rolls from one side of the bed to the other waiting for the news to be delivered. It is a horrible and heart-breaking waiting, counting the seconds that go away with less and less time to be left.

How long will it take? The Hallows are long gone, for sure. After that how long could it take to touch Snape' head and send him to an eternal rest? Is he long dead, but has no one noticed it yet? Is the mediwitch not with him all the time? What if Snape has to die all alone? After all this, Harry wants to tell himself he does not care, yet he knows he cannot let that happen.

He jumps from the bed then rushes down, running from the Gryffindor Common Room towards the dungeons. He follows the road he has walked with McGonagall and even he is surprised that he remembers the way and in the end, he finds the black oak door. It stands slightly ajar and Harry pushes it in, stepping inside the room.

The candles are burning, bringing the room in a weird sepia colour, yet the linen seems still too bright. There is a cold chill in that room, which is not normal, and to Harry seems faintly familiar. He remembers where he felt it not long ago, when he witnessed Death reaping a soul. He knows, even though he cannot see the creature that it is there with him in the room.

Frostwork blooms on the windows as it slowly fogs up. It is as if someone is blowing hot air on the icy cold surface. If he listens carefully, Harry can even hear the sounds of rattling breath leaving rotting lungs. It comes from in front of him yet there is no one there. He almost says "Show yourself" though he knows it would be in vain now. The creature is not compelled anymore to do anything Harry tells it to do. It is free to roam and to reap whoever it needs.

Something appears on the window, which makes Harry's heart beat faster. It is a word, "HE", written onto the fogged-up glass. The invisible hand is not done. Letters appear, one after the other. "IS" is the next word, and Harry knows how it will be finished even before he sees the letter G scratched into the mist.

HE IS GONE, says the sentence on the window. HE IS GONE writes Death now that there is no other way for it to communicate. HE IS GONE screams Harry's heart into the nothingness from the moment he has stepped into the room and noticed the white linen but did not see a body.

Snape is gone and someone has already noticed and took him away to where Harry could not have figured. He is gone and he will never come back. Though the chill, and with it Death as well, is gone, Harry feels cold. It is not the air but his very bones that are freezing, it is his heart that an eternal winter has settled on.

Chill creeps up on him from behind, sneaking up his feet, under his clothes, making the hair prickle at his neck. A face appears on the window where the frostwork slowly dries up. It is a face he had seen in his dreams and in reality; a face most thinks ugly but he finds honest, a face that has and will forever haunt him now.

He is not surprised when he seems to hear Snape's voice, deeper than ever as if speaking straight from hell.

"Even the first time you saw me, you wanted to bring me back. Why?" Says the deep, rough voice in Harry's head.

"Because you didn't deserve to die."

"No one _deserves_ death. No one _deserves_ life, either." Tells him the voice. "You angered the most terrible creature in this world and the one beyond. Why?"

Harry watches the face on the window, his broken heart weeping. He reaches out, trying to caress the warm skin, but all he touches is cold, damp glass. "Because you matter to me more." He whispers and before the voice could continue its relentless questions, Harry asks the one that haunts him. "You kissed me. Why?"

A hand descends on his and Harry gasps. A body, warm and solid presses against him from behind. He can feel lips against his ear, hot breath ghosting on his skin, and most of all, warmth everywhere. "Because when dead, one is supposed to do what makes one happy." Says Snape's deep, rough voice.

Harry is still terrified that it will all be gone in a second, that the moment he turns it will shatter like a glass castle in a hail, yet he cannot contain himself anymore. He spins around finding himself in Snape's arms. "You should do that even when you're alive," is all he can say.

They are kissing once again and, all of a sudden, Harry's swollen heart threatens to explode from happiness. Could this be true or has he gone truly insane?

"Are you alive?" He breathes against Snape' warm skin, his tone urging between heated kisses. "Is this real?"

"Indeed, I am," Snape nods, pressing their foreheads together. "This is real."

"How? Why?" Harry asks, yet he does not really care. All that matters is, that Snape is here and alive.

"When darkness comes, and settles in your heart, there is not much that can break in there." Snape tells him driving five fingers through Harry's hair. "One hour every night I had with you. Sixty minutes and not a second longer. Sixty minutes of light that became addictive. I thought I can let it go, let _you_ go, let the darkness take it all. There on the clearing, I still thought, it matters not whether I live or die. The fox showed me how wrong I was."

"How?" Asks Harry confused.

Snape steps away, but entwines their fingers. "You cannot lie to Death. You can deceive others, you can even lie to yourself, but nobody can fool Death. It felt the hesitation in me, felt how much I longed to feel your warmth again. It gave me one last option. And this time, I chose the light."

 **IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII**

 _Walk the halls and walk the forest,_

 _There is only warmth, no decay;_

 _See all that is, see all our bright light,_

 _For every hour of every day._

 **IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII**

 ** _Fin_**


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